


blue neighbourhood

by katarasvevo



Category: Love Simon (2018)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Growing Up, M/M, Neighbours, im so done, im weak okay?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-19 23:54:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14248566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katarasvevo/pseuds/katarasvevo
Summary: Bram Greenfeld is brilliant and bright, and Simon Spier cannot help but fall for him in a thousand different ways.





	blue neighbourhood

Simon is seven when he first meets Bram Greenfeld, and their meeting takes place under a bright cornflower-blue sky that’s filled with clouds so puffy they’re like cotton candy. Simon’s parents are hosting a neighbourhood get-together, and as such the backyard is filled with party streamers, loud music, the smell of cooking meat, and annoying, idle chatter.

It’s a hot day, a humid one, and honestly? Simon isn’t having a great time.

His friends just called in to say that they couldn’t make it, so here he stands, not knowing anyone and hating the way his shirt pinches his shoulders. Hating the way he can’t tie his shoelaces. And then all of a sudden he sees a boy just like him, too - alone and not speaking, standing right over there besides the grill.

It’s their new neighbour, it occurs to Simon. The skittish, brown-eyed boy who always dresses clean and nice. Who always seems soft-spoken, reticent. Unassuming.

A hand lands on Simon’s shoulder.

“Hey, go talk to him, Si,” his mother is saying to him, nudging him towards the direction of the boy. “You don’t want him to feel lonely, do you? I’m pretty sure you’ll be friends in no time!”

And so Simon sets out to befriend him, and he does it with his best grin. His most friendly voice.

“Hi,” Simon says to the boy, holding out his hand. “So, uh, my name is Simon.” The boy stares at him, doe-eyed, a little hesitant. Simon shuffles his feet, then continues, “You know, um, I don’t know anyone here, except for my parents, and I guess I like to make new friends, and I’m kind of sort of hoping that you could be my new one!”

The boy’s eyes widen, slightly. His features are arranged in a shy, nervous expression.

Just when Simon thinks that he has made a mistake, that maybe he came off too strong, the boy says, “Abraham,” in a tone it might as well be a whisper. A sigh. Then, as though as an afterthought, he adds, “Bram. For short.”

Somehow, the name really, really matches him. A nice name for a nice boy. “We should play together, Bram,” Simon says, testing out the boy’s name, and he wraps his fingers around Bram’s wrist, pulling lightly. Insistently.

(Later on, Simon’s father finds them both sitting on a tree branch, their legs dangling, mouths curved in a smile.

Of course, it’s Simon’s fault. Of course, Bram’s too scared to climb down - not until Simon says he’ll catch him if he falls.

And even though it’s only been a week since he moved into the house across the street, and three hours since they first talked, already Simon feels like he’s known him since forever, the way he knows Leah and Nick.)

 

☆

 

Simon waits by Bram’s door every day without fail - of course, unless it is raining.

They play games together, and invent worlds where only the two of them exist in. One day they could be astronauts, combing through deep space, and the other day pirates, looting the seas for something infinitely more precious than gold. They work hand-in-hand like this, like that, though it’s Bram who’s the more imaginative one of them both.

But no one really sees it that way, because he doesn’t express it flashy and gaudy like Simon does. He says what’s on his mind like he is reciting stories beside a crackling mantlepiece, his tone quiet, soft. Lyrical, melodic.

They grow up together side-by-side, and Simon is grateful to have a friend like him.

Quiet, soft-spoken Bram Greenfeld, with his sure, steady hands.

With his dimpled smiles, and his love for books, and numbers, and everything in between.

He is a nice boy, a very well-mannered one, and Simon’s parents adore him.

When Simon gets into trouble, Bram is there to back him up. When Simon scrapes his knees, Bram is there to help patch him up. Bram is there in most of his golden-bright memories, and Simon knows he’s lucky.

So lucky.

Sometimes Leah and Nick come over, and all of them play games. And then when they are gone or fast asleep, Bram will still be wide awake, and if the moon and stars are out he and Simon will head out to watch them dance overhead, fingers linked, breaths hushed, moonlight splayed across their faces.

Bram teaches him the names of the constellations - and even traces them onto Simon’s skin.

Orion. Hercules. Andromeda. Cygnus.

Through these light touches Bram shows him the universe, and Simon’s world blossoms into a thousand shades of glittering purple-black-blue.

 

☆

 

Soon they are nine, ten, eleven years old.

Bram takes up soccer. Simon learns how to dance. Bram wins math contests, memorizes the first hundred digits of pi. Simon acts his heart out in front of a hundred watchful eyes.

Maybe this is the point in time where their roads should diverge, but somehow, their differences only bring them closer together. Like two magnets of opposite charges drawn towards each other.

Simon wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

☆

 

Bram comes home with a bruise on his jaw one day.

Simon helps him ice it, cover it up, because Bram does not want his parents to know. Does not want them to worry.

There is quiet fury laced in Simon’s voice when he asks Bram, “Who did this to you?”

“Just … someone. He isn’t important,” Bram says evasively, and it is just like him. Quiet, quiet Bram who avoids confrontation and keeps things to himself but will never lie when asked. A little too hesitant, a little too passive at times.

Though, it does not take much coaxing to get a name out of Bram.

And it also does not take a long time before Simon rounds up Nick and Leah, so that the three of them can confront the bully like nobody’s business.

And then Bram finds out, and he wraps his fingers around Simon’s fingers, grateful but worried, and they spend a weekend riding bikes, eating ice cream, and playing board games.

 

☆

 

They are twelve when Bram shows Simon Morse Code.

Bram is good at a lot of many things - simple things, complicated things. He knows what binary star systems are.  He is familiar with concepts like thermodynamics, magnetism, momentum, and centripetal force. He knows how to tie five different kinds of knots. How to bake cookies so that they are firm on the outside but soft on the inside.

Blue is his favourite colour, and for that he recognizes its five million billion variations. Hues of aquamarine, of indigo, of navy.

He is familiar with each and every one of Simon’s moods. When he is sad, when is happy. When he is upset. Most importantly, he knows how to recognize them, like it is a deep-seated reflex as natural as breathing.

He is kind, wonderful, amazing, and Simon is lucky to have him.

“What does this mean?” Simon asks him when Bram flashes the lights in quick succession.

 _Dash, dot, dash, dash_ \- Simon can’t catch up. He makes a face.

“You are an idiot, Simon Spier,” Bram intones, playfully.

Simon buries his smile behind his hand. Rolls his eyes and pretends to be mad.

But Bram knows better. Of course he does.

“Do you really want to know what it means?” Bram asks, leaning closer.

“What?” Simon says, raising an eyebrow.

His lips are close to Simon’s ear now, and his breath is hot and warm against Simon’s skin. “You are amazing,” Bram says in a conspiratorial whisper, and Simon blushes, a pleasant ache blossoming in his chest.

 

☆

 

Junior high rolls around, and Bram joins the soccer team. He loses his baby face, and his figure fills out nicely. He grows taller, leaner, less unsure of himself. Girls start noticing him a lot, lot more, and it is not lost on Simon, the way their hands drift towards Bram’s arm whenever they are talking. The signs are all there, in the pout of their lips, the twirl of their hair. The gooey adoration in their eyes.

Bram goes out with them, sometimes. But never for long, never long enough for it to last a while.

And each and every time, it turns Simon oddly resentful. Kindles a simmering heat in his abdomen, ugly and red, red, red. Jagged, sharp. It tastes bitter on his tongue. Suffocating. It chokes him, sometimes.

But he pushes down on his feelings, because Bram is his best friend, and anyway they are quick to disappear when Bram gives him a soft smile or links their hands together.

Simon is thirteen, and very, very confused.

 

☆

 

Simon figures that maybe he is just jealous. And he does not like it. So like Bram, he goes out with girls, too. To school dances and burger-joints. To the malls and the movies. He lets them hold his hand, and lets himself smile at them. But it never feels right. Never feels like what romance novels say it should be.

It’s all what the other boys their age like to talk about. What it’s like to be with girls, the softness of their lips, the way they taste cherry-and-strawberry flavoured, or the way their hair smells.

Simon is fourteen when he nearly kisses a girl. He does not remember her name - Emmeline or Emma, maybe - but she is pretty, he guesses. In a soft, unassuming way. The kind of beauty that is not obvious at first sight. But her eyes, though, they’re damn beautiful - they’re the gold of the sun when it drips across the horizon at dawn. Simon should want to kiss her - should want to be with her, but her face is not what pops up when he thinks of kissing someone.

(Hands reaching out blindly in the dark, searching, exploring, fingers interlacing. Knees touching, mouths parted. Breaths coming out, slow, steady. Heartbeats racing.

A pair of dark brown eyes meeting his, starlit and deeper than infinity. Twinkling with the brilliance of Orion, Hercules, Androme -

Simon breaks out of his trance, confused, his heart racing a hundred million miles per hour.)

 

☆

 

They’re fifteen, and Bram stays at Simon’s house for a week and a half because his parents are off on an emergency business trip. They fall into a comfortable routine that runs like clockwork. Nora disturbs them, and makes them her test subjects for the wildest recipes she comes up with. Bieber skulks around in every corner, and barks at them whenever he is bored.

They listen to Elliott Smith songs. Play lots of video games. Do their homework - though, arguably, it’s Bram who does ninety percent of the work.

Leah and Nick come over. They watch the Bachelor, gorge themselves on too much bad junk food, and then pass out on the couch.

Except for Simon.

It is because Bram is pressed up against him, a solid, warm weight. Warm - so, so warm. He looks different when he sleeps - softer, somehow. Sleep, after all, does a wonderful job of dulling sharp edges.

In the semi-darkness, Simon gazes at him steadily. There’s an urge beneath his fingertips that tells him to trace and  search Bram’s face. The curve of his jaw. The swell of his bottom lip.

Swallowing, Simon feels his face heat up and then -

A dizzying, ice-cold realization sets in. Locks firmly into place. It all makes sense now. The jealousy, the resentment, the shyness, the confusion.

Simon was never jealous of Bram.

The want builds up in Simon, mounting, rising, accumulating. Simon wants, and wants, and wants, but he can’t - he just can’t. It would ruin everything.

Everything.

Simon’s world spins beneath his feet. Turns blue-cold, and grey. It is dark, dark, dark all over.

“Si,”  a voice whispers his name. Simon keeps his eyes shut, almost afraid to look.

Then, a thumb brushes against his jaw, feather-light, smooth, and Simon blinks.

Bram’s infinity eyes are staring into his own. And they are bright, brilliant, more radiant than anything Simon has ever, ever seen.

“Go to sleep, okay?” Bram says, and Simon’s heart clenches, and he does not want anything to change.

 

☆

 

“Have you ever liked anyone?” Bram asks him out of the blue one day.

All of a sudden Simon is hyperaware of the way their knees are touching. The way their fingers are so, so close to one another.

“I don’t - I don’t know,” Simon says, but his stomach does an unpleasant sort of lurch. He’s lying to himself, and his body, it seems, knows it better than his mind does. He peeks at Bram using the corner of his eye. “What about you?”

If Simon isn’t mistaken, there’s a faint blush on Bram’s cheeks. “I think so,” Bram says, and it sounds almost like a wistful sigh.

 

☆

 

Simon is gay.

Gay.

_Gay, gay, gay._

The knowledge burns its way up his throat, settles squarely in his mouth until he can’t breathe from it. Can’t feel. Though, a part of him had always known, of course. Passion Pit, Daniel Radcliffe, Brendon Urie, Draco Malfoy … The hyperfixations all make sense now.

Simon knows that his parents would be accepting of the fact. That his friends would be, too.

And Bram ...

He’d accept the gay part, Simon has no doubt about that. But the Simon being in love with him part?

(He can’t know.

He can’t.)

 

☆

 

Simon is careful around Bram now. He restrains his laughs. He minimizes his touches. He makes excuses.

He buries himself in homework. Loses himself into theatre. Crafts himself a mask, thick but fragile, and hides himself behind it. Bram turns busy, too, and they see each other less and less.

Leah notices. Nick notices.

“Simon,” Nick says to him one morning, voice careful, as though he is treading on eggshells. “Did you guys have like a fight or -” He pauses, wincing slightly at Leah’s glare.

“I’m pretty sure it’s nothing,” Leah says, and Nick’s face falls, but he does not comment on it further.

Simon shoots her a grateful look.

Then one night, a light flashes in Bram’s window across the street. Soft white-gold. There is a series of dashes and dots and pauses. Simon’s never been good at this, but he recognizes them well enough.

 _I miss you_ , the light says.

A smile settles on Simon’s face. Warmth bubbles in his chest, thick and cloying. He scrounges up a flashlight from underneath his bed, says, “I miss you, too,” with it, and falls. Harder.

 

☆

 

Nick throws a party at his place one day, and he invites people from all over the place, from different schools and neighbourhoods, from wherever, whatever. There’s also the new girl - Abby Suso, whom they’re all making fast friends with.

The quintessential high school party wouldn’t be complete without rowdy laughter, spiked punch, and even more terrible music, so there’s that, too. Along with couples trying to make out in the bathrooms.

Simon comes with Bram, but they go their own separate ways for a while. It’s a little too noisy, a little too disorienting, but Simon lets himself melt in with the flow. Soon his blood is bubbling, fizzing, rushing with alcohol, and then Simon is giggling, laughing, dizzy.

High.

That night is a little bit of a blur, to be honest. But he remembers looking into the blue, blue eyes of a boy not from their school. Remembers their breaths twining, their hands brushing, their  mouths crushing together. Remembers the feeling of hands slipping up the hem of his shirt, dipping into the waistband of his jeans, then Simon breaking away, half-giggling, half-stuttering.

The two of them, awkwardly stumbling away from each other, Simon crashing into his own car, Bram driving him all the way home.

 

☆

 

Months pass. Simon does not think much about that night. Does not have a reason to, so the memory gets put in the back corners of his mind, hidden under the weight of more important things. He attends his classes. Practices for their school’s upcoming production of West Side Story. He and his friends get to know Abby Suso well, and it does not take long before she becomes part of their group.

And okay, so maybe even if he and Bram aren’t as close as they used to be, they are still best friends, and that part isn’t going to change.

Life happens. Life goes on. It is peaceful. Normal. With Simon’s secret hidden in the closet, buried deep.

Until Martin Addison comes along, cyclonic in his appearance and just as devastating, threatening to ruin everything.

He confronts Simon in the library one day and says he has that secret picture of Simon kissing that boy from the party all those months ago.

Simon is furious. Up until now, he’d never thought badly of Martin, had always thought he was a decent enough guy despite the stupid jokes and embarrassing anecdotes, but now … “Delete them, Martin,” he says, the words coming out less angry than intended, desperate instead. “Just - god.”

He is seeing red, even though his world is turning blue, blue, blue.

“Chill, man, I’m not going to release them - under one condition,” Martin says, and he is foul, despicable, wrong. “Help me get together with that babeshow, Abby Suso. You’re best buds with her, right? C’mon, help out a brother over here.”

“Martin, don’t do this,” Simon begins, exasperated. “This is so stupid. Just think about this. Please.” It feels like he is the protagonist of a thriller fallen victim to a villain’s trap, ensnared in it, entangled, with no way out. He is looking down the barrel of a gun, and he is cornered from all sides. Trapped.

But Martin is a goddamn asshole, so he leaves Simon without a choice.

(No one else can know this way.

Not like this.)

 

☆

 

And so a few months pass by. Simon is half-hearted in his attempts, but Martin is a pest. He wheedles, cajoles, and pesters Simon on the daily. He cracks stupid jokes to get Abby to notice him, does inordinately stupid things to gain her attention.

It’s pathetic, he’s pathetic, and Simon is so done.

When Abby says, “Maybe Martin isn’t actually so bad,” one day, Simon bites down on an impulse to say, “Abby, the guy’s threatening to out me because he wants to get in your pants, how can he not be bad?”

For all of Martin and Simon’s combined attempts, Abby still gets together with Nick.

Martin is upset. Obviously. Simon tells him that they tried, they did whatever they could. Against all logic, he thinks that it is the right thing to say, at the time. But since Simon’s too much of a fucking believer in the innate goodness of people’s hearts, however small it may be (nonexistent, in Martin’s case), he does not expect Martin to release the goddamn photographs, leaking it all over the net.

He finds out through Leah, who alerts him about the post. Then Nora knows, too, and then Nick, and the entire school ….

And Bram ….

Simon shuts down his laptop, hands trembling. Feeling hollow and numb inside.

 

☆

 

The hallways are cold, cold, cold, and the whispers dig and crawl beneath his skin.

Everyone’s eyes are on him - or at least, he thinks they are. It’s probably because of that special breed of narcissism, Simon thinks bitterly, where you think that people give enough of a shit about you to actually talk shit about you. But the thing is, Simon isn’t reaching for something that isn’t there. Because _it is_ there, and people do care enough to whisper about him behind his back.

It’s only Monday, and as such the week is already looking to be overwhelmingly bleak. Simon’s hands, where they’re gripping the straps of his backpack are trembling. Shaking.

He’s already been labeled Resident Gay Number 2 - Resident Gay Number 1 being Ethan, first and original - by some doofus he passed by on his way to gym class this morning. The name is sure to stick, and it is already on a swift trajectory.

Simon just feels so overwhelmed.

Tired.

Numb.

He avoids everyone when he can - until he tries getting to math class and these two guys block him on the way there. Their eyes are cruel and teasing, their mouths twisted up into sneers.

“Well, if it isn’t Semen Queer,” one of the assholes says, dragging out the slur as though drawing it out will get it to hit home faster, harder. “Lover of dicks and balls.”

Anger surges up in Simon, followed by a crashing wave of frustration. He lets it build, rise, mount. Lets it turn ugly and hot. But for all of Simon’s walls still the jeers get underneath his skin. This causes him to lower his head and curl up into himself. His fingernails are so sharp against his palms, cutting crescents onto his flesh.

And then there is a hand on his shoulder. A warm, solid, steady weight.

Bram.

They’re dark and flint-edged, his eyes. They hold a quiet yet unsettling type of anger, something palpable and heavy that seems to physically occupy space. It is an anger that promises justice, and then some.

The insults land, but limply now. It’s more half-hearted, the way these assholes joke, and laugh, and say to Bram, “You must be fucking gay, too.”

Simon waits for him to deny it. Waits for them to quickly shut them down. Leave us alone, Simon wants to say. But the words are clogged up in his throat, tangled too tightly for him to breathe.

But the denial never comes.

The warmth disappears from Simon’s shoulder and transfers itself into his own hand instead. Bram interlaces their fingers together, and pulls Simon closer towards him. And then Simon freezes, unable to comprehend the gravity of what has just happened.

The boys stare, slack-jawed, just as confused as Simon. Just as shocked. Bram isn’t having any of it, though, and it’s evident in the way he says, “Pick a fight with Simon, and you’ll have to go through me, too.”

Maybe it’s due to some kind of divine intervention, if not happenstance, that Ms. Albright comes strolling down the hallways, towards the commotion. The boys look uncomfortable as she reprimands them, as Bram recounts the exact events that led up to this moment.

A shadow of shame crosses the boys’ faces, but Simon’s had enough of them.

He doesn’t realize Bram’s been saying, “Simon, let’s go,” until Bram bumps his shoulder against Simon’s. Gently. A light, simple touch - one that Simon recognizes deeply from memory. A shared habit, an almost esoteric secret.

_You okay, Si?_

Simon clenches his jaw - slumps his shoulders. It’s good as an answer as any.

They get into Simon’s car, and this time it’s Bram who drives. He pulls up at the parking lot of the nearest 7-11 convenience store, and buys a packet of Oreos and a small tub of vanilla ice cream. Together they eat in silence, watching the setting sun spill orange-gold hues onto the concrete, like a warm flood of watercolour paint.

He’s halfway done with his cup when he realizes that Bram’s been looking at him this entire time. His throat sticks, and his stomach twists - turns.

“Why did you do it?” Simon finds himself asking, quietly. It’s a fair question.

“I couldn’t let you go through it alone,” Bram says. His eyes - those deep, deep brown eyes - are churning with something unfathomable - something Simon can’t put a finger on. Nervousness, maybe - but ... why? “It wouldn’t sit well with me.” His fingers twist the fabric of his hoodie where it’s let out at the middle. “It would feel …”

“Feel what?” Simon says.

But Bram does not answer. Instead, his head bows and then he starts the car, leaving Simon confused and tired, but too drained to question his actions any further.

 

☆

 

The news spreads like wildfire, as it was bound to do, quickly trading ears, hands, mouths. The whispers carry down the halls - seem to carry corporeal weight, pressing up against Simon eagerly and relentlessly. All about that one thing, and that thing only.

Bram and Simon, Simon and Bram. Together, as in a couple.

Popular, smart, handsome Bram Greenfeld and meek, awkward Simon Spier.

A best-friends-turned-lovers kind of story.

Nick and Leah are not surprised by the revelation. That in itself in a surprise. Abby is happy for them, and she gushes about it, and Simon can’t bring himself to refute the statements. Can’t force the words to tumble out from his throat. Neither can Bram, and it is like they are both tiptoeing in shards of broken glass, waiting for the other to reveal the sham.

While Nick and Leah are not surprised, they are, however, curious. And it is evident in the way they exchange glances with each other, eyebrows raised, lips pursed in a tight line.

Later on, when Simon and Leah are alone, Simon finds it in himself to ask the question that has been sitting on his tongue.

“So, you’re not shocked or anything?” Simon asks, as they walk side-by-down the street. “Like, it’s totally not a surprise or whatever?”

It’s getting dark out, and the streetlamps have been lit, washing everything a dim gold. Leah halts, and fixes her gaze on Simon - a pensive, soul-searching thing. And for one moment it’s as if Simon is looking at himself through her clear-eyed perspective, like she knows this secret better than he does himself.

“Am I supposed to treat it like one?” She purses her lips, and then she says, slowly, each syllable drawn out, “I kind of suspected it, to be honest.”

Simon halts, tongue sticking in his mouth. “How?” It’s a wonder how he gets out the word at all.

Has he always been this obvious, this transparent? Simon thinks, and then instances, images, crawl by in the forefront of his mind. The way Simon’s stares and touches always linger a little bit too long for them to be accidental. The way he carries himself around Bram, completely sunlit, radiant whenever it is just the two of them - or when he thinks they are alone - and the way he is reserved, a little shier, when they are around other people.

“When you look at him,” Leah begins. “You look at him differently. Like there’s only him and no one else, if we’re going to be cheesy and all dramatic about it.” She pauses, then says, “And Bram -” before cutting herself off mid-way, tone filled with something soft, quiet.

“What about Bram?” Simon asks.

Leah shakes her head. Lets out a sigh. “You really don’t see it, do you? You’re an oblivious one, aren’t you, Simon Spier?”

Simon reopens his mouth to question her, but before he manages to get in a word edgewise she’s leaving, going, and -

Gone.

 

☆

 

It’s easy to maintain a charade when everyone believes in it.

Simon and Bram remain more or less the same, but that day where Bram stood up for him has permanently altered, warped the air between them. They don’t acknowledge the pretence, but they allow it to happen, and it seeps into their lives the way a sponge soaks up water - slowly, completely.

At first, Simon finds himself uttering his denials, but no one believes in it - at least, most people. But then time passes, and it becomes cemented as a truth, Simon and Bram being together. Simon considers the idea of avoiding Bram at one point, but he doesn’t, because he can’t. He doesn’t know how to. Doesn’t think he can bring himself to.

Every day is a little bit of a torture, a slow-burning scorch that consumes him from the inside out, because Simon _wants_. He wants so much. And he is falling, falling, falling, with absolutely nothing to break his descent.

It is so easy to pretend, because Simon is not even pretending.

Because Simon is in love with Bram.

It fills him with a hunger for hands interlacing, breaths twining, mouths drawn together, fingers fumbling messily in the dark. It’s redolent of a faded, starlit memory, where he and Bram are spread out on his backyard, watching the night sky stretch out high above them.

In this pocket of time, Bram is telling him a story about the constellations as he traces them on Simon’s skin, infinity eyes wide, bright. Full of wonder.

“Si, are you listening?” Bram is murmuring, voice as smooth as honey and just as sweet.

“I am,” Simon insists, but he isn’t, not really. Instead, he is thinking of the lightest dusting of freckles below Bram’s left eye. Wondering what it would feel to connect the dots.

Without thinking, his hand idly moves up to ghost along Bram’s cheek. When the realization sets in, he freezes and moves to retract his hand, but Bram’s fingers wrap around his wrist.

“I don’t mind,” Bram says, and it is a strange thing to say.

They are fourteen, and boys their age would flinch at being touched like this by other boys.

But Bram is not like the other boys. He has always been more.

(Clever, capable, distinguished, better, brighter, _everything_.)

“You sure about that?” Simon says. Bram nods his head, and guides Simon’s hand back into its original position.

Warmth spreads through Simon’s entire body, and every night after that Simon dreams of the cosmos in Bram Greenfeld’s eyes.

 

☆

 

Bram is tutoring Simon in his room when Simon first realizes that the cracks are starting to show. He is showing Simon how to untangle a particularly complicated problem on derivatives, one with sine functions, when his hand moves a little bit to the right, bumping against Simon’s.

Their hands brush against each other for a long time, maybe. Simon freezes, heart jackrabbiting beneath his ribcage as he wonders what it would feel like to interlace their fingers. Then Bram retracts his hand quickly, head ducking, cheeks reddening, and Simon lets out a shaky breath.

He looks away, trying not to look visibly hurt.

Well, this confirmed his own suspicions. Maybe Bram only stood up for him in that way because that’s what best friends do. Making sure that their friends don’t feel alone.

But Simon has never felt more alone than he does now.

 

☆

 

Martin Addison tries apologizing. He does it with frustration laced in his tone, and hands clasped beneath his chin. But Simon swiftly shuts his snivelling down.

Tells him to fuck off.

 

☆

 

Maybe things are falling apart from the inside, bit by bit, one by one.

At least, that’s how Simon is seeing it. And it’s pretty tough.

This charade can’t go on like this forever. All things have an expiration date, and this one is no exception, that’s for sure.

So Simon sends Bram a text message. Four words, four syllables. The letters imprint themselves onto Simon’s retinas, all harsh white lines against blue.

_We need to talk._

Simon doesn’t think he’s ever felt more cold in his life. Something inside him just _\- freezes and shrivels_ at the sentence. It’s exactly what he’s been dreading for days - weeks - and seeing it right there …

He’s making the right choice, he’s sure.

 

☆

 

School runs normally the next day, for the most part. There’s lessons, there’s lunch. The theatre club hosts a minor meeting during third period, and the principal talks briefly about fundraisers in the next. The day ends quicker than Simon would have liked, and the route to the bleachers turns his legs into sludge. Every step feels like wading through quicksand, every inhale like breathing underwater.

Naturally, Bram is already there. His backpack rests at his feet, and he looks lost in thought. But then his eyes lift and meet Simon’s own brown ones.

Simon sits beside him. He is hit with a vague sense that something is ripping, breaking, tearing.

(His own heart, maybe.)

“Everyone thinks we’re dating,” Simon allows himself to directly mention it for the first time.

Bram doesn’t speak. He nods his head, allows Simon to carry on. So Simon talks, and he talks about what’s been going on between them. The dating, the whispers, the falsehoods. His eyes are fixed onto his sneakers this entire time, and when he is done, he forces himself to look Bram directly in the eye.

“We can’t do this anymore,” Simon says. “It feels like one big lie.”

Bram’s face remains blank.

“Just - can you tell me one thing …” Simon takes in a deep breath, unsure of how to begin. “About that thing months ago, when these guys were calling me names. Why did you say what you did?”

“Remember the guy you were with? At the party?” Bram says, licking his lips.

Simon nods, not understanding the relevance. But he lets Bram continue without interruption. Each word twists the air out of his lungs.

“.... and so when the pictures were leaked, I thought that maybe that was the reason why you’d become so withdrawn and so secretive over those last few months. Like, maybe you were seeing him and didn’t want anyone to know. And I see.” He pauses. “We can just say that it was just a clean breakup. No hard feelings over there. I guess the reason I said what I did was because I wanted you to know that you weren’t … alone … and that …” Bram breaks off, hands twisting anxiously.

“Well, you don’t have to pretend to be someone you’re not anymore,” Simon says, his voice suddenly steel-edged.

Bram looks like he wants to say something, and that’s the problem, Simon thinks. He has so much to say, but he cannot even find it in himself to express his thoughts.

So there they sit in silence, washed a pale blue by the suburban glow that has settled onto the fields.

The silence quickly turns unbearable, though.

So Simon says, “I was never seeing anyone, and the reason I was quiet was because I didn’t want you to know that I was in love with you.” The confession happens just like that, simple, straightforward, tone angry and frustrated.

It is not a groundbreaking moment. There are no lights, no cameras. No close-ups, no music.

And then suddenly Bram is saying something - saying words that Simon doesn’t allow himself to hear. Doesn’t allow himself to think about.

So Simon does the only thing he is capable of in these kinds of situations: he runs.

 

☆

 

Simon shuts himself off for the weekend. He does not answer his calls, his texts, his emails. He absolutely does not spend hours gazing at Bram’s window, thinking about what he said, thinking about how he could have phrased it better.

But for all his second-guessing, Simon finds that he does not regret a single word. Even at the expense of maybe losing him, because it is the truth, clear and simple.

Simon is in love with Bram Greenfeld. All of him.

His gentle hands, his kind nature, his dimpled smiles. The small pout of his mouth when he is upset, the way he never fails to say “please” and “thank you”. The way he can make Simon feel like he is the whole universe all at once.

And those bright, bright infinity eyes, starlight-filled and miles deep.

Simon spends his Saturday afternoon doing homework, and then falling asleep by accident. It is dark out when he comes to, and it’s to a sound of a ping coming from the phone on his bedside table.

A text.

Simon unlocks his screen. The message reads: _Look out your window, Si_.

The moment he does, he sees a soft sunburst of light in Bram’s window. Simon holds his breath.

Then, it happens: the light starts flickering, on and off.

_Dot. Dot. Space. Dot. Dash. Dot. Dot. Space. Dash. Dash. Dash -_

Simon recognizes what it means almost immediately.

He thinks of Bram drawing lines and dots on his wrist. Teaching him meanings, and words, and whole sentences.

Simon can practically hear Bram whispering those words into his ear. Voice a smooth caress. Breath hot against his neck.

_I love you._

_I love you I love you I love you -_

And so Simon runs again - this time, though, he is not running away, but _towards_.

Towards Bram.

It barely takes any time at all to reach him, but each second feels incredibly drawn-out. Too long. By the time his feet have bridged half the distance, Bram is out of his house, already moving towards Simon, half-walking, half-jogging.

They meet halfway, and then Simon is burying his face into Bram’s shoulder, breathing him in.

The whole world fades away into white noise, and it is just them, bathed in moonlight and streetlamp glow. There are no stars out here tonight, but it does not matter.

Not when Bram’s eyes are full of them.

“I mean it,” Bram says, and Simon automatically knows what he means.

Simon stifles a sob, continuing to hold him close.

 

☆

 

They end up in Bram’s room, lying down on his bed face-to-face, like they did all the time when they were kids. Simon’s hand is warm against Bram’s, Bram’s fingers moving in careful exploration. Across the knuckles, and into the palm, chasing the curve of his lifeline from between the thumb and the index, down to the wrist.

The slide of his skin draws lines of dizzying friction, as though Bram is trying to re-memorize the shape of Simon’s features. The feel of them.

Bram tells him everything, right from the very start. How he has always been in love with Simon, how he tried keeping everything a secret.

Simon listens, and he feels that the whole world is staring back at him when he looks into Bram Greenfeld’s infinity eyes. And they are bright, lovely, _everything_ to Simon.

“So … We’re together now, right?” Simon says. “Real or not real?” His lips twitch as he wryly says these words.

Bram laughs, and Simon kisses him to steal the laughter directly off of his lips. “Real,” Bram whispers against his mouth, lips ghosting downwards to trace constellations onto his skin.

Their hands and mouths fit together like jigsaw puzzles, like they were meant to, and it is perfect.

Simon stays in Bram’s room the entire night.

 

**Author's Note:**

> this fic was titled "ugh troye is so powerful" in my google docs bcs i cant stop listening to his songs  
> i got so sick of this fic that i just decided to post this whatever


End file.
